I finished a book Kaitlin sent me last night called Thirteen Reasons Why. It’s a teen novel based around a girl that commits suicide. Now, before you check out, it’s not as depressing as it sounds.
The premise of the book is before the girl commits suicide, she records a tape for each of the 13 different people (reasons) that she pinpointed that led to her death. Before she dies, she sends the tapes to the first person on the list and then insists they listen to all of them, pass it on to the next person and if anyone fails to do it, the tapes are released to the public.
One boy that she did like and liked her is on the list and that’s who we follow as he listens to all the tapes.
It may seem a little grotesque to read an entire novel which serves as a suicide note but the story reads like a murder mystery, each chapter unfolding how the person affected this girl’s life.
I finished it in 3 sittings and I can’t shake the book from my mind today.
As you can imagine, many themes emerge from the book but I walked away remembering we’re all connected and even the tiniest of encounters, words, or actions can greatly affect those around us, even if they aren’t directly said or done unto a person.
I thought specifically about gossip and how I really have struggled with that over the years. Not that I made up lies and spread them or purposely spread untrue things. But I think at some points in my life I prided myself in knowing something another person didn’t. It took a few times of breaking confidence and hurting people’s feelings that I learned my job was not filling a person in on the finer points of someone else’s life.
Gossip is not just hateful or untrue talk. It’s ANY chit-chat over someone else’s personal life. Sure, there’s a time and place for talking about specific situations but overwhelmingly, it’s just plain old gossip.
Proverbs 18:8 from the Message says it like this: Listening to gossip is like eating cheap candy; do you really want junk like that in your belly?
It’s junk. Just plain old junk.
Track your conversations for a week and you’ll see pretty fast if this is an issue. If it is, stop it. I can say this because I had to say it to myself at one point. Just quit talking about e’erbody else!
In the book, you really see the affect of gossip and people’s opinions of each other. They drove this poor girl to her death. Let’s not believe the lie that our words don’t have the same power.
Curious, I looked up in the Bible about words and I determined there’s only two ways it refers to words. Life and death. That’s it.
Either your words are defiling, rash, corrupting, obscene, angry, careless, wrath-provoking, foolish OR your words are healing, graceful, life-giving, salty, gentle, satisfying, and joy-inducing.
Which is it?
Let’s be a people whose words heal and not hurt.
On Monday evening when dealing with Matthew my words were rash, angry, careless, foolish and to be completely honest, obscene. I was hurt, sad and most of all angry about being lied to. When I had a chance to calm down and speak to him about the situation he said something that broke my heart. He said he knew he should tell me the truth but was so concerned about disappointing me that he just couldn’t bring himself to do it. I’ve never felt like more of a failure as a parent than I did at that moment. Thankfully, we have talked about things since then and are meeting with our Youth Pastor tonight because the last thing I want in my relationship with my kids is them feeling that can’t count on my love as much as they can my disappointment.
With God’s help, next time I will remember to make sure my words are healing, careful and most of all graceful.
Carolyn, out of all the people I’m concerned about with my words, it’s my kids. Why is it the people we love MOST get hurt the WORST by our words? I think it’s true for many, many mothers. So sorry you guys were hurting. The good thing is you realized your mistake and made amends. Many parents would be too prideful to admit that they made a mistake or believe their kids deserve their hateful words because of what they did. *hugs* to you guys!
I agree with Amy; apologizing to our kids is SO huge. It models a great way to act. I hope things are more peaceful today!
Amy & Liz, thank you both for your encouragement. Matthew and I had a chance to speak with our wonderful Youth Pastor who helped us both tremendously. Matthew (who is very private about his feelings) had more on his mind that I would ever have guessed and the opportunity to talk and heal has helped us move forward from our terrible Monday.
Sometimes our job is getting our kids to the right 3rd person to help. Glad you had that resource and that it went well.
Amy, today I got caught up in celebrity gossip – and I know it’s because I actually want to understand how these things happen – family splits, hurts that we all share but unfortunately are playing in the public eye. HOWEVER I should just suss it out with one friend and figure out what there is to learn rather than feed the public discussion of it. Timely, for me!
It’s so interesting you brought up celebrity gossip. It really was the furthest thing from my mind while writing this. I suppose it falls under the same topic though–and hurts a little more! It’s so easy to get caught up in celebrity gossip. It truly is everywhere.